Report by Dave MacFarlane

http://www.planetfear.com/item/Brand_TheEpicTrivideodownload_2135_0_33572_1.html

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So last Friday saw the Endurance night sponsored by adidasTERREX at the Kendal Mountain Festival.  It was the first running of this special night, and the line up included Tom Gibbs, Ben Bardsley, and Ant and myself.

Tom gave a great wee interview with host James Thurlow, showing his rise to adventure racing legend, and Ben talked about a number of the amazing races he has competed in.

The main event though, and why the evening had been born was to show the film that Dave Macfarlane had made to show the story of our Epic Tri.

It was a brilliant film, showing the story really well, raw and emotional.  Dave had pieced together the footage he had taken and mixed it with the post event interviews and produced a stunning 38minutes of captivating film.  The film received a standing ovation, and made Ant and I very honoured to be able to share our journey with so many people, and for Dave to have produced such a great piece of work.

The plan is for us to send the film to other festivals, as we believe it works as a stand alone piece, but we are also looking at hosting the film somewhere so that it can be downloaded at a price that goes to Cancer Research UK.  Kendal Mountain Festival very kindly donated £1 from each ticket sold to CRUK too, which is fantastic.

Thank you to everyone who came along to watch the film and your kind comments about it afterwards.

Look out for updates on where you can view the film, its well worth it

Ant and I spent many hours ringing, emailing and asking around to get people to come and help support us on the epic.  Luckily for us, many folks made huge efforts to be there to help us out on all 3 sections of our journey.

This is a long post, but I think you will all agree worth reading, these guys were the real heroes, behind the scenes, or front of house, ensuring we got to the end.  Thank you all.

We had a core support crew of Aitch Carter, Jim Rounsley, Jane Brooks and Dave MacFarlane (Jane and Dave gave up their holiday canoeing in Scotland to continue to support us, a huge sacrifice to only get abused for the next week) .  These guys were amazing, getting the van all set up in the Lake District, seeing us off and back on the BG, driving the length of the country to support us on the tandem, and then cheering from many locks and bridges on the DW.

Aitch had willingly said that she’d love to come along, and despite a few protests nearer the time that it wouldn’t be the holiday she was expecting, she dived right in and was an amazing asset on the Epic.  Aitch and Jim had had many phone calls with some great suggestions, and ideas of how both Ant and my life could be easier, but importantly theirs could too.

Aitch worked tirelessly on the Monday getting the vehicle ready for us to head north, picking up all of the food kindly donated by Wilfs, and going through all of Ant’s kit so she knew where it all was for the journey.

Jim was a fount of ideas before the trip, thinking of all sorts of clever things Ant and I hadn’t even registered as relevant.  He took time out of his holiday to come and help us out.  Jim helped rig the van up to ensure that we could fit all our stuff in, and that we could sleep in it too.  He had to be held back from coming out all night on the BG to support, as we knew he would need his beauty sleep for the rest of the epic.

Dave and Jane as mentioned were due to go on a canoeing holiday on the West coast of Scotland.  Dave was keen to film as much of our journey as possible.  He had been at a number of the transitions on the BG, and then had been with us on the final run into Keswick along the roads.

Their plan was to help us at John O’Groats, and to be with us till Stirling.  However, both Jane and Dave very quickly decided that they had to come with us all the way, we are not sure why, but are incredibly glad that they did, it would have been nigh on impossible to do so without them, and I know Aitch and Jim were mighty relieved to have the additional help.

Non of these guys had any real experience in event supporting, Jane had supported me on the Nokia C2C in September, and was amazing, but that was just 9hrs.  This was a monster, almost 7 days in duration and 3 different sports.  Jim had worked on many Open Adventure events, but hadn’t spent too much time on this side of the fence, Dave had also covered many events, but again, his only real experience was again helping Ant on the C2C last minute.  Aitch had done some racing, so had a wee insight into what we were doing, and it had been with Ant, but still, this must have been a different demon to anything she had done.

Ant and I were oblivious to almost everything that the guys did, they kept us fed and watered and heading south, and are looking forward to reading one of their reports when they feel they have got over the trauma of spending a week with us both to write about it!

Without these guys we would have never have left the Lake District, and we are incredibly grateful for all that they did.  We are both fully aware how hard it was for them too, looking after 2 petulant boys, trying to solve all our issues, dealing with horrific traffic while trying to protect us, and enduring sleep deprivation too.

We had some other key supporters.  Tony Duncan (my dad) and Claire & Ralf Smits (sis and bro in law) were superb on the BG, ferrying all our support runners around, feeding us lovely pasta and sandwiches and cherry tomatoes, cheering us on, and in my Dad’s case smiling broadly at the fact that we didn’t quite get his BG time!!  Claire also knocked us up some great food post BG, pulled me out of my ice bath, and ensured that we got off to the North of Scotland in the best possible state.

Chris Gazely and Trudy were also fantastic support on the DW.  Chris headed up this section, as he’s done it before, keeping us on the straight and narrow all the time (apart from missing one meet up it was flawless!).  On this section Ant and I both had our little helpers, my girlfriend Maz came along to stuff malt loaf, porridge, pasta and, overcoming her huge fear, creamed rice into my mouth!  Emma, who is a good friend of Maz and I also came along, and did the same for Ant, our own little feeders for the kayak section, (they did make an appearance on the bike too, which was a huge boost to me especially).  They were both fantastic, working tirelessly through the night, making sure we were both ok, asking what we wanted next, and best of all, bringing us a bacon buttie at some time in the morning.  They had had to find a greasy spoon van in the middle on Newbury in the middle of the night – supreme work, thank you.

All of the above were key, and without them we couldn’t have even started, but there were many many more people that made the Epic Tri a success, and you should all be very proud of what you did to help us get to the line, without the immense support from you all, we would probably have failed, but you guys all spurred us on, mended our bikes, picked us up when we were down, distracted us when we hurt, and beasted us when we needed it.

One name really stood out though, and that was Andy.

We were helped by an Andy for a massive distance. First up was Andy Kitchen, who sorted out our food for us, Ant and I had been so preoccupied with getting sorted for the whole thing that we had forgotten about this major part!  Andy kept us good.  Andy Mitchell then took over, running leg 1 with us, guiding us over the first few hills, and shocking us with his chat!

Andy Kitchen then came back onto leg 3, running with us all the way to Honister.  We nicknamed him the Oracle, as he knew all the shortcuts, the sweetest easiest lines to the next hill, and was on the watch all the time, encouraging us to go faster, telling us when to ease up.  (We were worried about not having him on leg 5, so Dave Harrison kept going with us taking on Andy’s role.)

Andy K didn’t stop there, he bullied us into an ice bath, and made sure we stayed the 10min course he’d prescribed, then waving us off in our van.  We thought that was it, but no, he was back.

Arriving into Edinburgh’s outskirts, Andy appeared again, this time on a bike, where he rode with us all the way to Moffat, and after a short break joined us from Gretna to Carlisle, mending a puncture on the way, and helping us deal with our energy and water retention issues.

Andy Mitchell then popped up again in Carnforth.  He had managed to get some more time off work, so came to help once again. He wasn’t sure how far he’d ride, but thought maybe Stafford.  I think it was Gloucester that we finally managed to full wear his legs out, a Trojan effort, including a cramped sleep in a cold van too.  Again, he kept us going through a long dark night, when we were feeling sleepy he’d make some comment that would almost make Ant and I fall off the bike, keeping us fully alert.

Once Andy M had gone, Andy Wilson stepped up to the plate, joining us just north of Bristol.  He was our navigator to Taunton.  He led us beautifully to a loo in the centre of Bristol, then to the airport, where we put him and Johnboy in charge of our rest stop.  Upon waking Andy told us he was coming to the end, amazing.  He rode with us to Taunton, where we met with his girlfriend Fi, then on to Exeter and then down the A30.  Andy had a wee rest in the van as we were going too fast for them to keep up on the big hills, but he joined us again from Bodmin to guide us to the finish, helping out when we had a wee coming together with a car!

Sadly this was the end of the Andy’s, but they had done an amazing job, and Ant and I now know that if in need, reach for your contacts and dial an Andy, they will get you through, thanks a million boys, it meant a heck of a lot to us both.

Many other people played huge rolls too.  Gorgeous George is a friend of Maz from uni, he was very keen to come and help, and along with his bike, he was instrumental in us completing the DW.  He rode along side us for almost the entire distance, keeping us chatting, scouting out portages, riding ahead to warn our crew, and regaling us with countless limericks.

The roll of honour goes on, from runners to bikers to kayak support, and also as previously mentioned the massage support from Super Sue.

Eddie Winthorpe very quietly and slightly under the radar ran the entire BG round with us, thus getting into the club too, (he’d previously almost done it but for a severe ankle injury near the end).  He took pictures all the way round, recording the times at each top, and then filing this all to the BG club to get our time officially recognised, all done and dusted before he joined us on his bike near Bristol to rally us along, as well as taking our support crew in for a much needed shower and feed (still jealous about that though!), then popping up on the DW taking brilliant pictures and cheering us on, thank you.

Ant Cooper and Sally Ozanne were also fantastic, running leg 2 of the BG with us, then cycling through Kendal, then hot footing it down the country to ride from Gloucester to Lands End, and then running from Barnes Bridge to Putney hooting and hollering from the tow path at 11pm at night, brilliant.  It was amazing guys, you made such an effort to be with us, and bringing your Dad to end Sally was very sobering, and pretty flash too, don’t suppose many other DW ‘ers had a uniformed soldier cheering them on at the finish line.

Matt Martindale was another behind the scenes supporter, he, and his girlfriend Jen, not only roped us up on Broad Stand, to make sure we didn’t fall to our deaths, but he had spent hours working on the tandems, initially cleaning them up from the awful state they were in when we first got them, but tinkering with them, fitting new cables, brakes, handlebar tape, and making sure they could go as fast as possible.  He help was invaluable, thanks Matt.

There are so many people to mention, the Claytons for driving through the night to find us and being amazing support riders from Sandbach to south of Wolverhampton (ish), Phil Green for our massage in Stafford. All the guys in Cumbria who rode over Shap with us, the pub in Burton in Kendal for giving us dinner, Mags for her amazing t-shirt, Dan Halliday for taking us over the Forth Road Bridge, and getting a great shot of us weeing from it!! Iain Stamp for the most amazing quiche ever on a cool Friday morning.

Jake Morgan for riding to find us near Gretna, and mending our puncture, Chris Mcsweeny for trying to break our bike on his steep local hills, Vin Cox for doing a tiny ride  (compared with his round the world record breaking ride, 163.5days) and mending our rear derailleur.  Johnny Mayne for bringing us the best tasting pizza in the world ever, Nige for blagging us an ice lolly, Fi Spotswood for trying to kill me with a salmon sandwich, and her huge mate, who’s name I forget for being a true machine on a bike.  The North Face Meeting crew for running leg 5 with us, taking time out of their busy schedule to do so!!  Stevey B, Alex Pilkington, Mick Kenyon, for running legs of the BG (Alex did legs 3 and 4)

A final specific shout to all the random folk who drove past in cars, shouted from the side of the road, or the bank of the river, you made us smile and forget our pain for a short while, thank you.

I am sure I have forgotten many people, but that’s mainly because I was a total wreck for most of the Epic, and wasn’t really overly switched on, it by no means reflects on your invaluable help, it was a case of so so many people helping us out.

So I think that’s it, a huge journey for Ant and I, but made so much easier by the friendship and support from so many friends.  Some ran, some rode, some cheered on bridges, some saw us off from the start and welcomed us back at the finish, some tooted their horns, some went miles out of their way, some went further than they intended, some couldn’t keep up, but all of them were a part of our Epic Tri, and that is something we will both remember for ever with cherished memories.

Thank you from the bottom of my heart, for helping us to achieve something extraordinary.  We owe you one.

 

Bruce.

As news of what we achieved trickles through to those people in the know, we can hear their jaws drop. Or the viral of our friends taking great pride in telling the poor folk who once thought that any one of the challenges were tough that there is a new challenge to try. For this we are really sorry, but what ultimately got us through the challenge was the thought of what we were doing it for. There are many more people out there that will benefit from this if we can keep doing our bit. I know there are lots of people doing stuff for charity these days and probably the main reason why we put in such a stupidly strong bid to be the challenge that you supported. So please direct the people that will appreciate what we have done to our site. We only have £2000 to collect to hit our target and make the most of the numb nuts and chaffed butts.